Guest essay by Eric Worrall
I’ve just listened to the entire BBC radio series “How They Made Us Doubt Everything”, which compares climate skepticism to rejecting the link between tobacco and cancer.
Episodes 1-5, all I heard was details of how the tobacco industry sowed doubt about lung cancer – interesting but largely irrelevant to the climate debate.
Episode 6 starts with a few details of Ben Santer’s custody battle for his son, then segues straight into saying how his life is also tough because he is a climate scientist. The episode then dives into Myron Ebell’s battle against the Kyoto Protocol, claiming Ebell’s plan to oppose Kyoto was just like the “white coat” campaign against tobacco regulation.
It is worth pausing for a moment to reflect on some of the reasons why Ben Santer has encountered a few frustrations in his career. Ben Santer became a Climategate star because of his email fantasy of perpetrating violent assault against Pat Michaels, but this is not all that Santer did. Ben Santer also seems to have spent a fair bit of time thinking up excuses to fend off requests for data referenced by his published papers, while writing angry emails to colleagues about the persecution he was enduring. “Can any competitor simply request such datasets via the US FOIA before we have completed full scientific analysis of those datasets?” (Climategate Email 1231257056.txt). Stephen McKintyre describes Santer refusing a polite request for data on the Climate Audit website.
Of course none of this was mentioned by the BBC.
Episode 7 contains a quote from science communicator Susan Hassol, who seems to think ordinary people don’t understand the word “uncertainty”.
Episode 8 talks about Jerry Taylor. Jerry used to be a climate skeptic, but changed his mind after talking to Joe Romm in the changing room after a live debate about James Hansen’s work. Jerry discussed what Joe Romm said with Pat Michaels, about Hansen producing more than one scenario, but was unsatisfied with Pat’s response; Jerry left with the impression he had been “duped” by climate skeptics.
I’m not sure why Jerry feels he was misled; according to our Willis, Hansen’s Scenario A underestimated CO2 emissions by 25%, but predicted double the observed global warming. The other Hansen scenarios were a better fit for the observed temperature trend, but drastically underestimated CO2 emissions. Hansen got it wrong.
Episode 8 also mentions the BBC advising their journalists “we do not need a denier to balance the debate“.
Episode 9 focuses on smearing Dr. Willie Soon. In my opinion the BBC attempted to make funding for Soon’s research look like Dr. Soon received a million dollar bribe from the fossil fuel industry. The part the BBC leaves out of this grossly misleading attack is the grant was paid over a period of ten years. Lord Monckton estimates Willie Soon received less than $60,000 / year after the Smithsonian took their cut – not exactly life changing money.
WUWT published Willie Soon’s excellent response to the BBC’s biased questions, which Soon received from BBC producer Phoebe Keane a few weeks ago.
Episode 10, “Leaving the Tribe”, discusses former Republican representative Bob Inglis being dumped by his district after he embraced climate alarmism, though looking at other sources it is unclear whether climate alarmism was the primary reason Inglis was dumped – Inglis did plenty of other things which likely upset his supporters.
Producer Phoebe Keane then complains in episode 10 that when Willie Soon responded to her biased questions, she also received angry emails from other people Dr. Soon copied into his response. Keane then wastes listeners time discussing her disdain for the people who wrote to her, but doesn’t actually present what Dr. Soon said in his response.
What can I say – this is not the BBC I grew up listening to and watching. In my opinion “how they made us doubt everything” is an innuendo heavy smear, rather than a genuine attempt to enlighten BBC listeners.
The BBC “How they made us doubt everything” series spent two episodes of their 10 episode series vilifying Dr. Willie Soon, then failed to present Dr. Soon’s response to their attacks.
Regardless of whether you think Dr. Soon is right or wrong, Dr. Willie Soon deserves better than this one sided gutter press assault on his reputation from the BBC. Even dictators and murderers are often given an opportunity to argue their case on the BBC. But this is a courtesy the BBC “How they made us doubt everything” series has so far failed to extend to a mild mannered law abiding climate scientist, who was unfortunate enough to be a prime target of their latest ugly smear campaign.
Update (EW): h/t Dr. Soon – Corrected the spelling of Susan Hassol’s name. Naomi Oreskes has expressed her support for the BBC series.
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Dwindling number of people taking any notice of the BBC.
dwindling number of people believing anything scientists say. And it is the fault of scientists for not decrying ClimateGate malfeasance for fear their own field may get the spotlight.
Amen, you can count me as a dwindler.
This should have been about TV journalism: “How they Made Us Doubt Everything we see on telly.”
So true HotScot – indeed, its ‘journalism’ is now so openly biased that many can’t stand even having the radio on. One thing is for sure…if you are poor, white or – heaven forbid – MALE there is no interest in you from the BBC.
The programme is comically and aptly named ‘How they made us doubt everything’. The ‘THEY’ is the BBC. The propaganda, bias and distortions dished up daily by the BBC and their fellow travellers have made us doubt everything. They could have called this programme ‘An example of how we at the BBC produce fake news and destroy trust in the media!’
Glad I missed almost nothing but more smears. Thanks for the report, Eric.
Is that true? Or did you hear it on the BBC…….
Government owned-and-run media conforms to government-supported narrative. Surprised?
For all its faults and bias, the BBC is NOT government run
It is leftist run, far worse.
And leftists run the government.
It is government-owned, but theoretically independent management and editorial-wise. It is dependent upon the government for setting the fees that fund it. So how independent does that really make it? Considering that for the most part it remains compliant with the Progressive mode of the government, I’d say not very. Does anyone doubt that if the BBC became heavily critical of the agendas of the sitting government and Houses of Parliament that their funding would remain stable?
Is John the Econ a troll account ?
He completely misrepresents the reality
It is not government owned
The government gives some money to the BBC to run the World Service broadcasting to other countries.
Strangely the BBC WS is relentlessly lefty woke
even though the Conservative government elected in December has a massive majority
The BBC throughout has a groupthink that hates the Conservative government, hates Brexit
and devotes massive amounts of time to hating Trump.
All news is like the way that CNN treats Trump
The headline will run “Boris Defends”, and then they’ll put on a Labour Party voice.
The BBC charter was last year renewed for the next 8 years
The poll tax that you MUST pay unless you prove you never watch ANY live TV or UK internet TV broadcast, even if you never watch BBC
cannot be magically cancelled
that’s how come the BBC constantly gives the government the finger.
Why does not a conservative government repeal the poll tax and force the BBC to support itself? Does argument ever come before Parliment?
I will take notice that we have a conservative government in the U.S. when PBS/NPR are defunded. Don’t expect to see it before I’m 6 feet under.
You are making the fatal mistake of thinking that the Blue Labour Conservative government is actually conservative. It is not and the party has not been for decades which leaves conservative people in the UK with no party to vote for. Unfortunately, they have continued to vote for the Conservative Party, which only won the election because the Red Labour Party was even worse, which perpetuates this centre-left liberal party.
The BBC exists by government warrant – if it didn’t you wouldn’t have to pay a licence fee.
Not government run – but beholden to.
The biased corpse has only continued to survive thus far because it gave some pretence at political “neutrality” whilst daily insulting ordinary people. That came to an end when the politicians finally realised that in order to get into power, they had to support the policies that the people wanted (like Brexit) – and ones that the biased corpse loathed so completely it used to destroy any politician or party that dared to entertain these “popular” policies.
It is now de facto at war with those parties who dared go against its dictat and support the people (i.e. its viewers) which it had hitherto thought it had managed to brainwash into believing its vile political bullshit.
In other words, it is now at war, not just with its own viewers, but against its paymasters in the political classes, and I don’t think it takes a genius to work out what is going to happen to it.
A very good example of how the BBC goes about reporting politics was a recent Panorama programme. This had various ‘health experts’ commenting on (ie. criticising) the policies of the Conservative Government. Deliberately or otherwise, the BBC just forgot to mention that all of these ‘health experts’ had a record of being critical of the Conservative government and all had connections to the Labour Party or pro-Labour organisations.
https://order-order.com/2020/04/28/panoramas-ppe-investigation-party-political-broadcast/
Unlike the Canadian CBC and most of Canadian media now receiving dollops of “government” money AKA my money and thatof many other unwilling Canadians.
$1.3billion direct subsidy, some of it likely filtered thru the WE charity scam artists
You are correct, it is not government run. Nor, surprisingly is it leftist run, although one would be hard put to see the difference at the moment. The BBC has always and will always be the voice of the Establishment, that shadowy conglomeration of all the competing interests that have power and influence, the people that have always directed and controlled the political and governing classes. It used to be that these hidden powers would wax and wane in influence and so political direction would from time to time change as the changing powers sought what was best for them and their interests. That all changed post WW2. The British Establishment was subsumed into what has become an international Establishment, currently in the Western democracies the globalist elite, variously called the 1% or the 3% or the deep state. This Establishment has also subsumed what used to be independent powers in that club, the MSM media in general. That is who the political class, the MSM and the BBC, the intelligence services and the governing services now work for, not so much entities to be nudged, directed and guided from the shadows as previously, but more as tools used to bend the world in the direction they desire, that world is you, me and the man in the street by the way.
So it is leftist, glad you cleared that up.
This defines the Overton Window, where for any ideology, the goal post are shifted to the advantage of the elites. Also, it is written by Marx and Engels in their opinions.
Nio, its not government run. But it is financed through a regressive tax, and like all taxes, non-payment of the tax is a criminal offense.
The way it works is that to watch any live TV without paying the BBC tax is a criminal offense. Its as if to be allowed to shop at a supermarket you had to pay a tax to get a permit. And the results of this tax are then paid to one particular supermarket. So, for instance, you shop at Tesco without paying the tax. You are breaking the law, committing a criminal offense. Pay the tax, you can shop at any supermarket you want, and the proceeds will go to (eg) Waitrose.
Waitrose shoppers will then find that things are very good value there, despite its high overheads, wide aisles and, and lots of minority interest stock, and argue vehemently for keeping the system. Look, they will say, even baked beans are cheaper at Waitrose, you see what good value you get for paying the license fee?
Right. And what is the value the Tesco shoppers are getting?
In many ways its the worst of all possible worlds. The management is an uncontrolled self appointed oligarchy, and it does not have the usual constraints of businesses, the need to keep the customers onside, because the source of funding is guaranteed regardless.
So the management is incented to do what it currently does. Part of it is to run lots of lowest common denominator entertainment, to keep up the audience numbers. The other part is, with that as a justification for the continuing tax funding, to run its own activism program based on the personal ideologies of the management. Which recruits only like minded colleagues.
You could see this on plain view, if you were looking, during the recent series on Murdoch, which was pure propaganda. The radio climate series referred to in the piece, I have only heard a couple of episodes, but its basically channeling ‘Merchants of Doubt’. It too is straightforward activist propaganda.
There are two media groups in the UK who are only masquerading as news organizations, one the BBC, the other Guardian Media. Both think or at least claim that they are independent. Both are run by self appointed oligarchies whose priority is to get certain policies and views promoted. The BBC is tax funded, the Guardian by a foundation. But the results and the management style are just about the same, as are the objectives.
Amusingly enough both fulminate regularly about fake news and the Murdoch empire….!
The solution, in the case of the BBC, is to make the license fee voluntary. That is, fund it from voluntary subscriptions. A first step in that direction would be to decriminalize the license fee. That would clarify some minds.
How right wing global warming deniers support the BBC thesis by denouncing the BBC thesis
No surprises there, then.
They certainly made me doubt the BBC a long time ago.
I hope Dr Soon finds the time to demand a right of reply.
I hope he find time to sue them !
That is completely out rageous writting asking him for comment then refusing to air any of it and slander him instead.
Religion is about faith, science is about doubt. Nullius in Verba.
The biggest con of course is the greenhouse effect and that geothermal is negligible.
http://phzoe.com/2020/03/04/dumbest-math-theory-ever/
http://phzoe.com/2020/04/29/the-irrelevance-of-geothermal-heat-flux/
Geothermal is less than 0.0001% the power of solar. It’s negligible.
You will never learn. Will you?
http://phzoe.com/2020/05/22/equating-perpendicular-planes-is-plain-nonsense/
Nonsense is still nonsense, no matter how many times you repeat it.
BTW, have you finished that paper yet. If even one tenth of what you claim is correct, you’ve got at least a dozen Nobels in your future.
In that “market”?With all the financial thimble-rigging around all “renewables”, starting with their very spread and ending in tangible effect on products present (or smelly effects, in case of methane “monster digesters”)?
Its place in a market that isn’t even allowed to work like a real market means nothing at all, beyond the obvious “those who regulate the market don’t want this” (because if they wanted, it could be “big” whether it makes much sense or not, just like those giant windmills and giant sludge-bomb digesters).
Which is what Zoe Phin claims (among the other things), after all.
Ah off-topic Zoe strikes again.
The only surprise would’ve been if this aggressive posturing wasn’t the central point of the series. The BBC have long-since abandoned any sense of climate balance. It’s obvious this hit-piece series of TEN (!) episodes was commissioned to smear Dr Soon in particular and climate sceptics in general.
The series’s title alone betrays their bias. Today’s journalism consists of writing the narrative first then getting quotes from people to fit that narrative. If you don’t give them the quotes they want, you’re ignored. Sloppy, lazy journalism. The only thing worse is just going to Twitter to find quotes you want. That way you don’t have to even talk to people.
CNN: Fake News. BBC: Fake News With An Accent. Dr. Willie Soon: The Real Deal. Next?
Oh, well, no CNN or BBC anymore there.
Only BBChi and ChiNN..
🙂
Ceers 🙂
The title of the podcast could easily be interpreted as a phrase coined by a member of the general public, where “they” could legitimately be referring to BBC, ABC, CBC, CNN, MNSBC, etc etc.
Make no mistake, large sections of the established mainstream and social media platforms have dedicated themselves as rabid disciples of the CAGW religion, where heretics are to be cast unto the flames of hades.
(Well, I suppose it’s easier to just run climate ooga-booga stories every day than go out and find actual relevant topical news that requires proper investigation & research)
I miss the BBC, it was a reliable source of news for so very long and now it is just more leftist crapspew. How sad.
Which begs the question – why the leftist crapspew from the top of the pyramid of command? I just don’t get it. Are they just totally unable to climb down from their high horses. If Boris wasn’t such a media toadie, he could fix the problem overnight, as could I.
Leftist political ideology is a destructive mental disease, like syphilis, and contracted in much the same way.
No conspiracy theory needed, MSM world wide has been bought by the Marxists. It’s part of their plan towards domination. Look into the Marxist ideology and you’ll find media control is necessary to squelch the opposition and spread their vitriol.
Journalism in most universities is part of the arts faculty … aka leftist boot camp. So those that graduate are more likely to be lefties.
All of EUs and US schools were corrupted back in the 1880s when Engels and his armies invaded them. The rest of the world was next.
How much do the Brits pay for this “service” again?
A UK TV Licence costs £157.50 (£53 for black and white TV sets)
https://www.gov.uk/tv-licence
90% of which is spent on the BBC
https://www.tvlicensing.co.uk/check-if-you-need-one/topics/what-does-your-licence-fee-pay-for-top13
It’s a criminal offence to watch live TV or use BBC iPlayer unless you have a valid TV licence. Without one you risk prosecution and can be issued a fine of up to £1,000, plus court costs.
https://www.stepchange.org/debt-info/tv-licence-fines.aspx
MG
Guess they will be coming for me! I listened to BBC for years without paying any Royal tax, then again my ancestors fought a fairly nasty war over Royal taxes. 😉
Nothing for the radio, we pay a licence fee for the box, I dont know anyone who pays the licence.
‘They’ made us doubt everything by lying to us.
Didn’t Ben Santer completely rewrite an IPCC report in a way that completely reversed what had been agreed by the working group?
The 1995 IPCC Report:
Broad Consensus or “Scientific Cleansing”?
http://www.pne.people.si.umich.edu/PDF/ecofables.pdf
If you look up “noble cause corruption” in the dictionary, I’m told you get a photo of Ben Santer.
The lunatics took over the BBC asylum long ago …
You can make a complaint here :
https://www.bbc.co.uk/contact/complaints
MG
Don’t waste your time
They just palm you off
You have to stick at it for months and follow the whole process through to get results.
The best way is to publicly tweet the presenter/producer before or during the broadcast.
Apparently the only fishery in Great Britain with no take limit is red herring.
Does the BBC not realise that their title “How they made us doubt everything” applies as much to themselves, the BBC, as anyone else? How sad that they cannot even ask themselves that question, at a time when many are suggesting “defunding” the BBC altogether, and the government is seriously doubting the need to continue the “broadcasting tax” at the end of the current settlement.
That sort of self-knowledge would at least help one think that they are part of this difficult business of divining truth from so many conflicting propositions.
I write as a BBC pensioner, after 22 years as a TV and radio producer…
I remember your name from various credits!
Thanks for your support Ken. The BBC descending into performing one sided hatchet jobs risks undermining any remaining support. You don’t have to agree with Dr. Soon to feel concern about what the BBC did to him.
If you look up “noble cause corruption” in the dictionary, I’m told you get a photo of Ben Santer.
In your note about episode 8 and the BBC “not needing a denier to balance the debate”, this is now a regulation througout the BBC, they are now not allowed to let “climate deniers” say anything. As you say, almost anyone else can say what they like, within reason, but not “climate deniers” under any circumstance. I am in fact surprised that they invited Dr. Soon to give an opinion, they must have known that they would not have been allowed to broadcast his reply.
I haven’t listened to any of the programmes, my high blood pressure wouldn’t let me.
Dr. Soon shared her email requesting a reply to charges with all of us. It was obvious from the phrasing of her questions that she was adversarial and looking for Soon to provide something incendiary rather than asking for his rebuttal of charges. She had to contact him, journalistic rules require it, but she didn’t do it in good faith. I hope some day someone dies the same to her.
Is there no British law or regulation which forbids the BBC to behave this way? Is there no regulation or law being enforced that mandates a balanced and unbiased presentation of all issues the BBC discusses? If there indeed is, why is the BBC allowed to ignore it? If British taxpayer pounds are used to fund the BBC, it seems the BBC should be obligated to be neutral and disinterested third parties in any debate.
These questions might well apply in Australia and Canada as well ( with the ABC the CBC). Here in the U.S., most news outlets (save for PBS and NPR) are not funded by govt tax dollars, so no such obligation exists and the constitutional right to a free press protects them from govt mandates. U.S. outlets can be biased as hell… and they are.
As an American, this is something I’ve wondered about for a long time, and I would appreciate some enlightenment here.
The irony, is that probably a far higher percentage of climate sceptics now watch the biased corpse than the general public. That is: older middle class and educated, whereas, most people don’t care about the Biased Corpse, because they have already found their entertainment elsewhere.
So, ironically, the people most likely to support this relic of a bygone age: are the people that the biased corpse spends most time attacking. They don’t seem to be able to help themselves LOL! The less support they have, the more they attack the few people who still support them.
I don’t think they need any help to self-destruct.
I stopped watching BBC after the last episode of Eastenders.
I didn’t even watch the first one…
The BBC has very strict impartiality rules and an external regulator Ofcom
but they are both stuffed to the gills with Woke-supremacists
so the BBC chooses to breach that charter all the time
and gets away with it.
The BBC must have a mass of Kompromat on Boris and his government cos they never take action;
all they do is refuse to appear on shows.
And the same for commercial stations cos they also have Woke-supremacist groupthink.
Only a couple of shows on a digital only radio station Talk Radio are different.
Thank God for Fox News, NewsMax and One American News.
Hard core Texan, retired engineer & USN vet, Fort Worth.
Read how Olivia De Havilland went off script to expose the con of communists leading a Hollywood group to attack Truman and democracy in the WSJ today. It takes a few brave souls to expose the groups and their scripted extremism leaving the architects as the only members. Today’s scripted groups are like invasive weeds and serpents.
A better title regarding the BBC would be “how they made us believe everything”.
https://www.aei.org/carpe-diem/50-years-of-failed-doomsday-eco-pocalyptic-predictions-the-so-called-experts-are-0-50/
1. 1967: Dire Famine Forecast By 1975
2. 1969: Everyone Will Disappear In a Cloud Of Blue Steam By 1989 (1969)
3. 1970: Ice Age By 2000
4. 1970: America Subject to Water Rationing By 1974 and Food Rationing By 1980
5. 1971: New Ice Age Coming By 2020 or 2030
6. 1972: New Ice Age By 2070
7. 1974: Space Satellites Show New Ice Age Coming Fast
8. 1974: Another Ice Age?
9. 1974: Ozone Depletion a ‘Great Peril to Life (data and graph)
10. 1976: Scientific Consensus Planet Cooling, Famines imminent
11. 1980: Acid Rain Kills Life In Lakes (additional link)
12. 1978: No End in Sight to 30-Year Cooling Trend (additional link)
13. 1988: Regional Droughts (that never happened) in 1990s
14. 1988: Temperatures in DC Will Hit Record Highs
15. 1988: Maldive Islands will Be Underwater by 2018 (they’re not)
16. 1989: Rising Sea Levels will Obliterate Nations if Nothing Done by 2000
17. 1989: New York City’s West Side Highway Underwater by 2019 (it’s not)
18. 2000: Children Won’t Know what Snow Is
19. 2002: Famine In 10 Years If We Don’t Give Up Eating Fish, Meat, and Dairy
20. 2004: Britain will Be Siberia by 2024
21. 2008: Arctic will Be Ice Free by 2018
22. 2008: Climate Genius Al Gore Predicts Ice-Free Arctic by 2013
23. 2009: Climate Genius Prince Charles Says we Have 96 Months to Save World
24. 2009: UK Prime Minister Says 50 Days to ‘Save The Planet From Catastrophe’
25. 2009: Climate Genius Al Gore Moves 2013 Prediction of Ice-Free Arctic to 2014
26. 2013: Arctic Ice-Free by 2015 (additional link)
27. 2014: Only 500 Days Before ‘Climate Chaos’
28. 1968: Overpopulation Will Spread Worldwide
29. 1970: World Will Use Up All its Natural Resources
30. 1966: Oil Gone in Ten Years
31. 1972: Oil Depleted in 20 Years
32. 1977: Department of Energy Says Oil will Peak in 1990s
33. 1980: Peak Oil In 2000
34. 1996: Peak Oil in 2020
35. 2002: Peak Oil in 2010
36. 2006: Super Hurricanes!
37. 2005 : Manhattan Underwater by 2015
38. 1970: Urban Citizens Will Require Gas Masks by 1985
39. 1970: Nitrogen buildup Will Make All Land Unusable
40. 1970: Decaying Pollution Will Kill all the Fish
41. 1970s: Killer Bees!
You should send that to the BBC.
+41
A GREAT List to copy
I still trust the BBC to report cricket scores accurately. Not much else.
England won the cricket!!!! ….. hang on that can’t possibly be true can it?
compulsory lady commentators now.
As well as mass pushing of women’s cricket and women’s football.
The BBC compares climate skepticism to rejecting the link between tobacco and cancer
Actually no.
It reflects the kind of logical fallacies one finds
in Why are fire engines red?
Because they have eight wheels and four people on them,
and four plus eight makes twelve,
and there are twelve inches in a foot,
and one foot is a ruler,
and Queen Elizabeth was a ruler,
and Queen Elizabeth was also a ship,
and the ship sailed the seas,
and there were fish in the seas,
and fish have fins,
and the Finns fought the Russians,
and the Russians are red,
and fire trucks are always “Russian” around,
so that’s why fire trucks are red!
Works for me.
But I’m Irish 🙂
Could have used the analogy of rejecting the link between socialism and crimes against humanity.
Good One !!!!
“Religion is a culture of faith; science is a culture of doubt.” – Richard P. Feynman
When I first approached the Climate Change issue, my first read was that the alarmist side of this were acting like the statisticians at the Tobacco Institute.